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February 2012 First Person Radio Archives

Join Laura Waterman Wittstock and Miguel Vargas today as we talk with Elaine Salinas and Joe Rice, members of Phillips Indian Educators, or PIE, and members of the Metropolitan Urban Indian Directors, the group that signed a historic second agreement with the Minneapolis School District that spells out how the Indian children of Minneapolis will be taught.

This Memorandum of Agreement between the Minneapolis Public School District and the American Indian Community of Minneapolis, represented by the Metropolitan Urban Indian Directors and its member organizations recognizes that education failure has condemned generation of American Indian people to poverty and diminished life opportunities and that this failure must finally be put to an end.

Join Laura Waterman Wittstock and Miguel Vargas today as we talk with Cantemaza (NEILMCKAY) (Spirit Lake Dakota and Turtle Mountain Ojibwe). He has taught Dakota Language at the University Of Minnesota, Twin Cities for 12 years. He received a BA in American Indian Studies at the University of Minnesota in 1997. He is a Dakota language activist and his specific teaching and research interests are in the area of preservation and restoration of the Dakota language and culture by creating Dakota speakers at various levels of proficiency in both academic and informal settings. He is currently working on his Masters in second Languages and Cultures at the U of M.

Listen in to Laura Waterman Wittstock and Miguel Vargas as they talk with Susana di Palma and Heid Erdrich who are collaborating on a new performance piece called Zorro: In the Land of the Yellow Breasted Woodpecker. It’s a story about two Ojibwe girls who are rescued from boarding school by a masked trickster.

Listen in as First Person Radio hosts Laura Waterman Wittstock and Miguel Vargas talk to four artists about the New Indigenous Film Festival, a co-presentation of Intermedia Arts and MIGIZI Communications. All of the feature films are premiering in the festival that opens on February 23rd in Minneapolis, MN. Curator John Gwinn is joined by Theresa Sweetland, and Armand Garnet Ruffo.

Listen in as Laura Waterman Wittstock and Miguel Vargas talk to Bill Tilton about the life and times of Marv Davidov. A celebration of the life of Davidov, founder of the Honeywell Project, will take place March 10th at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, MN. From Wikipedia: “ In 1987 Honeywell purchased land in the Black Hills of South Dakota with a plan of creating {a} testing site there. Honeywell Project members worked in Minneapolis to support a group of white ranchers and Native Americans that called themselves the “Cowboy and Indian Alliance” or “CIA”. The Honeywell Project reasoned that if Honeywell could not find a place to reliably test its weapons it would be unable to manufacture weapons of sufficient quality to sell to the military. In the end Honeywell was unable to install its testing site anywhere and Honeywell converted the land into a sanctuary for wild horses.” Tilton volunteered with and supported Davidov over several decades.